Black Ops 4's Multiplayer Server Send Rates Have Been Lowered from 60hz to 20hz

Megalith

Megalith

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YouTuber Battle(non)sense's latest video demonstrates how the final version of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4’s multiplayer differs from the beta: apparently, its multiplayer-server send rates have been reduced from 60hz to 20hz. DSOGaming calls it a “lag fest,” explaining the game “sends data at a rate of 20hz, despite players running the game with really high framerates like 90fps or 120fps.”

Practically, this means that you may empty an entire magazine at an enemy and not kill him/her mainly due to these low tickrate values. It also means that you can’t get a proper feeling of hitting or getting hit as the tickrates are significantly lower than your “local” framerates.
 
Presumably this was done so that they could run more server instances on the same or cheaper/less hardware.

Next they'll come out with a subscription service that offers "premium" servers and experiences for a $14.99/mo fee which plops players on servers with the original, higher tickrate.
 
lol I haven't played since COD4 on PC.

And glad i've never gone back I prefer Battlefield games anyways.
 
Pretty shady that the game shuts down if it detects data program running. Just think if this was a streaming game
 
This actually looks bad on blizzard/activision as well. They should have never ever made this game part of their stable associated with others. This move is purely becuase they didn't have enough physical hardware. The tick rate dropping like this I would assign to spinning up too many VM's on a host. Across the board. From basic understanding it appears like they trippled the number of vm's running in the cluster.

And here is the rub. Tripling the number of physical servers they are running (if they are beastly) can be very VERY expensive. Now if these are running in a public cloud like amazing on google or whatever they should have been able to scale up on public cloud resources as demand rises.

The only real excuse here is either.... they are running this on a privately own cloud that didn't have the capacity to scale out the server load as needed to keep responsiveness as required, OR they were too cheap to pay to scale it out. Or and this would be nuts... the design requires a common server that everything passes through and the number of host servers scaling out overloaded that one server where it can't respond in a timely manner. Perhaps this is a physical server so updating it is impossible on the fly to give it more resources.

Or this is just a business move and once the spike dies down game experience will stabilize and be much better.
 
Grimlaking said:
This actually looks bad on blizzard/activision as well. They should have never ever made this game part of their stable associated with others. This move is purely becuase they didn't have enough physical hardware. The tick rate dropping like this I would assign to spinning up too many VM's on a host. Across the board. From basic understanding it appears like they trippled the number of vm's running in the cluster.

And here is the rub. Tripling the number of physical servers they are running (if they are beastly) can be very VERY expensive. Now if these are running in a public cloud like amazing on google or whatever they should have been able to scale up on public cloud resources as demand rises.

The only real excuse here is either.... they are running this on a privately own cloud that didn't have the capacity to scale out the server load as needed to keep responsiveness as required, OR they were too cheap to pay to scale it out. Or and this would be nuts... the design requires a common server that everything passes through and the number of host servers scaling out overloaded that one server where it can't respond in a timely manner. Perhaps this is a physical server so updating it is impossible on the fly to give it more resources.

Or this is just a business move and once the spike dies down game experience will stabilize and be much better.
Click to expand...

All are just poor excuses in 2018. I really doubt they have some 4-6 year old architecture that isn't amazon/Microsoft/whoever cloud. All they have to do is pay more money temporarily to the cloud vendor and quick scale up. They are choosing not to do so likely because the budget was limited to a set amount, and are hoping people don't notice the 20hz non-sense. If what you say is the case you are right - it looks really bad.
 
Yea this infrastructure SHOULD be on a cloud to serve customers. They are not doing real edge compute where timing to the MS is that important. They want low latency for a global player base. This desire is damn near PERFECT for a cloud infrastructure. But keep in mind Blizzard/Activision already HAVE a global infrastructure. I would bet that is where this game is being hosted from. And that has harder limits than what a trillion dollar company like Amazon can afford to have available.

Really it's guess work based on personal knowledge. So take it with a grain of salt. Bottom line is this COULD have been executed without astronomical hardware costs, allowing a scale-able hosted solution. But either they are too cheap to do it that way, OR, they didn't execute and the code doesn't allow that kind of expansion for licensing or design reasons.
 
So the main thing I take away from this is not the bullshit move from 60hz to 20hz polling, but rather it originally polled at 60hz. Where's the benefit in rendering the game locally at 144hz or 240hz if the server is only validating one of every four frames or so.

Sounds like the 'cant see difference' fools may have been right. Next thing we'll be hearing is 'I totally got a headshot on you, but the server didn't capture that frame...'
 
Grimlaking said:
This actually looks bad on blizzard/activision as well. They should have never ever made this game part of their stable associated with others. This move is purely becuase they didn't have enough physical hardware. The tick rate dropping like this I would assign to spinning up too many VM's on a host. Across the board. From basic understanding it appears like they trippled the number of vm's running in the cluster.

And here is the rub. Tripling the number of physical servers they are running (if they are beastly) can be very VERY expensive. Now if these are running in a public cloud like amazing on google or whatever they should have been able to scale up on public cloud resources as demand rises.

The only real excuse here is either.... they are running this on a privately own cloud that didn't have the capacity to scale out the server load as needed to keep responsiveness as required, OR they were too cheap to pay to scale it out. Or and this would be nuts... the design requires a common server that everything passes through and the number of host servers scaling out overloaded that one server where it can't respond in a timely manner. Perhaps this is a physical server so updating it is impossible on the fly to give it more resources.

Or this is just a business move and once the spike dies down game experience will stabilize and be much better.
Click to expand...


While Blizzard is indeed part of the name, it should not be run through the mud. Blizzard folks had zero to do with this trash.
 
Big fucking difference bw 20 and 60. Beta seemed fine but if I played it at 20 I would have been pissed off. It makes such a huge difference in tdk. I can kill 3 in a clip at 60. At 20 it would take luck to get 2. Even with a shotty or something heavy close range with their backs to me. Not cool. Just so you can make more money when you already made how fucking much? This and ea shens making it tough for me to play shooters anymore.
 
This game seemed to have a lot more hype in my gaming circle but I still don't care. Kind of tired playing fast twitch FPS. Haven't bought a COD since MW3 and probably won't buy this one either. To be honest I think most FPS's these days are really boring.
 
Fortnite is free to play and runs about as smooth as a single player game but COD, charging $60 a copy and with billions in the bank can't do better?

Gotta admit the game looks promising but I think I'll stick to Fortnite when I want the fast, easy distraction of a battle royale game.
 
Its just like apple. If the name has Iphone in it, its gonna sell.. Just like anything with Call of duty.. Hell I bet they could make a farming simulator, tack on Call of Duty some where on the case, and they'd sell 500 mill in 2 days..
 
So is this basically saying if I have a 13 ping, it’s going to feel like 60ms?
 


This guy puts into perspective how trash this game is as well. COD hasn't been good since COD4. It's also the same engine since then (albeit they added a few features and made the performance crap)
 
I would run a SP game in 60 FPS, but something i was competitive about in MP i would not run under 120 FPS, and i would prefer +200 FPS though my screen cant match that in Hz and so it would be a little senseless at the moment.
When i did game competitive online i did so in 768X1024 > 200 FPS and 200 Hz on my CRT monitor, and you better be on your A game when you ran into me :sneaky:
 
idiots will keep buying the games so it won't matter.

as a side note, is it common place to refer to data transmission cycles in hz like this? This is thr first time i have come across that.
 
Exavior said:
idiots will keep buying the games so it won't matter.

as a side note, is it common place to refer to data transmission cycles in hz like this? This is thr first time i have come across that.
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Yes, anyways has. It’s the update rate that the server is fixed to.
 
Lol, CS:GO has 128tick options for LAN servers. Uses a ludicrous amount of bandwidth, even for just 5v5, but it's night and day over the default 64tick option (which is used in MM btw).

20hz or 20tick equivalent? What a fucking piece of crap.

Can't wait for Madden FPS 2018 to be the last nail.
 
Been watching some Shroud play the BR mode... the 20hz doesn't seem to affect him at all but then he's already godlike at shooters.
 
elite.mafia said:


This guy puts into perspective how trash this game is as well. COD hasn't been good since COD4. It's also the same engine since then (albeit they added a few features and made the performance crap)
Click to expand...


LOL that was a pretty funny video. TBH it made the game look fun more than bad despite the long TTK he pointed out.
 
MavericK said:
Step 1: Remove single player campaign.

Step 2: Fuck over multiplayer with greedy bullshit.

Step 3: Still somehow profit because idiots keep buying this shit.
Click to expand...

at some point, i hope multiplayer is treated as the "value add" for a game, like it used to be.

for shooters it's so easy to use multiplayer to monetise other purchasers, thereby further reducing costs.

only shooters i've bought for multiplayer were q3a, ut1, ut2002+2003, and ut3.

im a fan of the ol' LucasArts formula.

ps: it's a travesty that full throttle remastered isn't on xbox.

w/e.
 
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